


People Like Us

by conceptstage



Series: Single Chapter Critical Role [85]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-27
Updated: 2019-10-09
Packaged: 2020-09-27 23:27:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20416060
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/conceptstage/pseuds/conceptstage
Summary: Vex is visiting Tary and covers for him when there is no one else available for a mission to find a missing little girl in Kamordah.





	1. Chapter 1

Vex looked up when Taryon walked into the dining room that morning and frowned, seeing the hurried expression on his face. “Something wrong?”

“Yeah, I just got word that a little girl was kidnapped in Kamordah, I don’t have anyone to spare to go look for her,” he said, shaking his head. “I’d go myself, but I need to be here when Jena comes back from her mission.”

Vex had come to visit him to get away from the others for a little while. She loved them, of course, but everyone was walking on eggshells around her and Keyleth. Kiki had dealt with it by just telling everyone off, snapping at them with tears in her eyes and then immediately apologizing. She seemed to feel better and the others left her alone more, so maybe that would have been the better idea for Vex as well. But Percy was so sweet and Pike was so kind and Grog was so… Grog. She just needed a break. 

“I can go,” she said, taking a large bite of her hashbrowns and then downing her morning cup of beer. She jumped up to her feet and wiped her hands on her shirt. “Kamordah is just a day down the road, right?”

Taryon looked shocked. “Vex, I can’t ask you to do that. Your…” he paused and frowned.

“My brother’s dead. I know. I need something to do, Tary, I need something to work on. I love you, I do, but I’m going crazy just watching you work all day.” She kissed his cheek and smiled at him. “I’ll just be a few days. Give me the information on the girl.”

Vex took the letter that had been sent to Tary, donned her armor, and rode into the morning sun.

Kamordah was a nice enough town, Vex assumed, riding her horse through the streets. People gave her some space here, whereas in any Tal Doren town people would have flocked to see and talk to her. It was nice to have a bit of anonymity after such a quick rise to the spotlight. Keyleth would enjoy this, she should bring her along next time. The Voice of the Tempest didn’t get a lot of time to herself these days.

She steered her horse towards the estate indicated in the letter and was met by a butler, who took the letter inside as someone came from the stable to take her horse. The butler returned quickly and lead her into the magnificent house. It wasn’t quite Whitestone levels of extravagance, but she could see her younger self breaking into this place with her nearly identical partner in crime.

She was met in the living room by a lovely woman in possibly her mid twenties and a slightly older man in his early to mid thirties. The woman was dressed in the delicate fineries of someone who had never had to work a day in their lives and the man was in something a bit more practical, like he expected to do a lot of walking but no actual manual labor.

“You’re the mercenary?” the woman asked, giving her an unimpressed look over.

It had been a long time she’d been called that. “Yes, Ma’am. Vex’ahlia.”

The man cleared his throat and stepped forward, shaking her hand sternly and staring directly at her soul through her eyes. “I am Sir Lionett, owner of Lionett winery. And this is my wife. Our daughter has been missing for three days.”

Vex blinked from his intensity and general lack of emotion. His daughter was missing, why did he seem so blase? “Your letter said you thought she kidnapped? Do you have an leads?”

The woman sighed and sneered at the archer in distaste. “No, I thought that’s what we were paying you for. Dear, just let the local guards handle it. I don’t like involving riffraff.”

Vex gave her best diplomatic smile. It was kind of refreshing, actually. No one at home told her the truth anymore, everyone just told her what they thought she wanted to hear. “Trust me, Madam, I’ll return your daughter. So you have no idea who might have taken her? Any enemies? Anything you can tell me about her? What’s the name?”

The woman sighed again and rolled her eyes. “You deal with this, Love, I’m going to get more wine.” Then she stood and left the room.

The man ignored his wife completely. “Her name is Beauregard. She’s four. I’ve no idea who might have taken her, she just disappeared from her room four days ago.”

Vex opened her mouth to ask another question and then frowned. “Did anyone see her get taken?”

“No.”

“Then how do you know she was taken? She might have just run away.”

The man gave her a smug look like he thought she was a simpleton. “No. That’s impossible. She knows better than that. She knows what would be awaiting her here if that were the case.”

Vex stared at him for a moment, then cleared her throat. “Yes, of course. May I look at the scene of the crime, please?”

The man nodded and waved at the butler that had brought her in. “Take her to Beauregard’s room. And watch her closely.”

The butler bowed and then started up the stairs. “Of course, Sir.”

Vex waited until there was no one looking at her to scowl. This entire situation was painfully familiar. She followed the butler up the room and he kept a close eye on her as she surveyed it. The room was spotless. “This is how it looked when you realized she was gone?” she asked.

“One of the tutors realized she was missing when she didn’t come to her afternoon lessons.” No one noticed before then? No one came to check on her in the morning, no one thought it was weird when she didn’t show up to breakfast? “The room had been cleaned by then. I’ve spoken to the maids that were assigned to this room that day and they said that there was nothing amiss, except the window was open.”

Vex sighed and pushed open the window, taking a deep breath of sweet, spring air. She frowned and turned to the butler. “You don’t actually think this was a kidnapping, do you?” she asked. The more she saw, the more certain she was that this was just a run away.

The butler finally showed a bit of emotion, frowning and looking down at his shoes. “Lady Beau… I would not doubt that she would do such a thing. She’s intelligent, beyond her four years. She’s willful and quick as a whip. And she’s unhappy here.”

Vex smiled softly at him. “You care about her, don’t you?” Of the three people she’d spoken too, it seemed this butler was the only one.

“All the staff do.” The butler cleared his throat and stared ahead, trying to mask his feelings. “Lady Beau deserves more,” he said quietly. “And she knows it. I would not be surprised if she ran away to find it, but I would never say so to the Master.”

“Free with his hands, is he?” Vex asked, sneering as she leaned out the window farther, looking down the wall. “No need to say it, I know the type.” The butler remained quiet. There was a trellis nearby, possibly how she got out without being seen. It wasn’t extremely close, it would have taken a good jump to get to it. It wouldn’t hold her weight but it could probably handle a child. She hopped up on the window sill, ignoring the butler’s cry of shock, and leapt over near it, hitting the ground and rolling easily back up to her feet. She looked the trellis over with a keen eye and spotted a vine that seemed to have been crushed by a tiny, bare foot. “Bingo,” she muttered, looking down at the ground under it and finding it disturbed. 

“Ma’am!” the butler called from the window.

“I have tracks. Tell the parents I’m on the case and will be back shortly,” she called as she followed the tiny footprints down the side of the house and towards the dirt road. The tracks continued down the road for a while before breaking off into the trees. Vex followed them carefully. There were broken twigs and crushed mushrooms leading her on when the footsteps disappeared in the brush. It wasn’t far into the trees when she started to smell smoke. It was old, possibly hours old, doused when the sun had risen over the horizon. She followed it quietly, being careful that her weight didn’t snap a twig to alert the girl of her presence. 

“Take that!” said a voice. “And that! En garde!” She smiled slightly as she peered around a tree to find a little, barefoot girl with brown skin and hair that were both covered in mud and leaves. She was holding a stick like a sword and fighting with a low hanging tree branch. There was an unlit campfire nearby, crudely made but functional, and a babbling brook with clear, cool water.

“Are you showing that tree whose boss?” Vex teased, tensed in case she tried to run.

The girl jumped and cried out in surprise, whipping around with the stick held out in front of her protectively. “Who are you!” she demanded. “What do you want?”

Vex held up her empty hands as she stepped closer, stopping when the girl took a step back and slowly lowering herself to sit. “My name is Vex. I was hired by your parents to find you. Beauregard, right?”

Beau sneered at her and didn’t lower her makeshift weapon. “I’m not going back. Tell that old man to shove this stick up his butthole!” then she threw the stick at Vex and turned to run into the trees.

Vex dodged the stick easily and dashed forward, running in front of her and holding out her arms. “Hold on, hold on! I just want to talk!”

Beau kept running towards her and Vex held out her arms, prepared to catch her, but the girl ducked down and slid between her legs, scrambling back to her feet on the other side of Vex’s body. Vex spun around and caught her under her arms, lifting her in the air while her feet kicked uselessly.

“Let me go! I’m not going back!”

Vex sighed and started walking her back to her little campsite. “Come on, we’re just going to talk.” 

“Grown ups always say that but they really mean: listen to me while I yell at you and tell you you’re bad,” Beau grumbled, crossing her arms and sneering at the older woman.

“I’m not going to yell and you’re not bad. We’re just going to have a little chat, just you and me.”

“I’m going to bite you,” the girl said, matter-of-factly.

Vex laughed and sat her down on her feet by the tree she’d been fighting. “I have a pet bear who I raised from a cub, I can handle being bit.”

There was an instant change in the girl’s face and her eyes widened with wonder. “A pet bear?” she exclaimed. “Can I see it?”

“He’s back at my house on Tal Dorei right now protecting my husband. His name is Trinket and he is the very best bear in the world.”

Beau grinned. “I wanted a pet rat, but my mom made me get rid of it.” Vex would have liked to see that exchange. She imagined the stuffy, self obsessed woman from earlier screaming and jumping around at the sight of her daughter’s rat. “They’re actually super clean and neat, they’re not dirty and diseased like she said.”

“I know, darling,” she said quietly. She sighed and reached out to tuck a loose strand of hair behind Beau’s ear. “And I know what you’re going through. You have been born into a family that does not appreciate you. They might never appreciate you.”

Beau sneered. “But they love me right? That’s what people say, they hurt you but they love you.”

“No, people don’t hurt people they love. I won’t tell you otherwise. But listen, okay? Someday, you’re going to make your own family.”

Beau’s sneer twisted up even more in disgust. “Like marriage? Egh, no thanks.”

Vex laughed and shook her head. “No, dear. Not like that. Someday you’re going to find a group of people who love you as much as any parents could love you. You will find people who don’t share your blood that will call you their sister. People like us, we have to build our families from scratch.” Beau frowned at her but there was hope in her eyes. Vex stood and held out her hand. “Come on. You can’t live out here, though I have to say I’m immensely impressed you’ve gone this long.”

Beau crossed her arms. “I could live out here forever if I wanted.”

“I’m certain that you could, you’re very resourceful.”

Beau seemed to consider her carefully for a moment and then reached out to take her hand and allowed herself to be pulled to her feet.

As Vex rode away from the house that afternoon, she wondered if she’d done the right thing. She couldn’t have left a four year old to live alone in the woods but maybe there was another option that she could have considered besides returning the girl to her parents.

She glanced over her shoulder and tried to find a face in a window. FInally, she caught Beau’s eyes. The girl was standing on the roof and when she saw Vex looking, she grinned and waved, ignoring the frantic maid calling at her to get down from there before she broke her neck.

Vex laughed and waved back before disappearing down the road.


	2. Chapter 2

Vex hummed quietly to herself as she moved through the crowds in Zadash, looking for the familiar red hair of her best friend. They’d been making this trip every year for the last twenty years in a row and every year, without fail, Keyleth wandered off into the sunrise to go talk to a malnourished tree or yell at a gardener who was treating the flowers too roughly. ‘Find Keyleth Before She Somehow Gets Arrested’ had become one of Vex’s favorite vacation activities. She’d only lost once.

Vesper, her oldest daughter, usually tagged along on this trip ever since she’d turned sixteen, but she was taking more after her father the older she got and had locked herself in her workshop. The twins turned sixteen before next year’s trip, perhaps they’d want to come along instead. But, for this year at least, it was just her and Keyleth.

Vex came upon the tree in the park within the Tri Spires. It was doing much better since they first came upon it, nearly dead, on their first trip to this city when Keyleth had lectured the woman in charge of the park to point where the poor woman started crying. It might even bare fruit in the spring. She smiled a little and ran her fingers over the bark.

“Ah!”

There was a cry of surprise from above her as something fell out of the tree and crashed on the grass beside her. She reached instinctively for her bow but suddenly remembered that she had left it at their inn. She had a dagger on her belt, but when she stopped to think about it, it was probably just a child or something, so she didn’t reach for it right away. She looked down to the small creature at her feet and blinked in shock. Her hood had fallen back in the crash and Vex met the wide, yellow eyes of a goblin, covered in bandages. 

They stared at each other for a moment, as if time had stopped, until the goblin made a noise of panic and scrambled up to her feet and ran into a nearby alleyway. “Caleb!” the goblin screamed.

Vex finally reacted, taking off quickly after the creature and pulling out her dagger. That goblin was a danger to the citizens here, if nothing else she needed to figure out how it had gotten into the city. Goblins never traveled alone, so there was probably bigger group of them waiting in the darkness somewhere. The goblin disappeared around the corner just as Vex entered the alleyway after her and she sped up, throwing herself around the corner and then skidding to a stop, the tip of a wooden staff mere inches from her nose. 

There was a young woman standing there, her dark hair in a braid with an undercut, wearing a sleeveless blue coat and a crop top. Her brows were turned down in warning when Vex met her sharp blue eyes. She was standing in a ready position, prepared to fight, with her staff held out in warning. She didn’t move, even when Vex leaned to see around her.

There was a group of people behind her, none of them with weapons out but ready to fight if needed nonetheless. A blue skinned tiefling with a shocked expression, a red haired man with his hand on the dark skinned young woman’s shoulder like he was either trying to hold her back or support her (Vex wasn’t sure which), a half orc with a glowing sword on his belt, and a tall as fuck creature that she didn’t recognize with white and pink hair who just smiled kindly at her.

“Problem, friend?” The half orc asked in a deep, warm voice with a sharp edge.

“There was a-” She cut herself off when she spotted the goblin, watching her from behind the red head’s coat. When she met Vex’s eyes, she disappeared behind his protective stance. She looked back up to the hard eyes of the woman in front of her and took a big step back, her hands up placatingly and her dagger held loosely between her fingers. “I see. My mistake.”

“Next time mind your own goddamn business,” the young woman said, sneering.

The red haired man squeezed her shoulder. “Beauregard,” he said, a bit of a warning lilt in his thick accent. “We should go.” The woman started to lower her staff but she was clearly still keeping her eye on Vex.

A few puzzle pieces in her mind suddenly connected with a long, nearly forgotten memory. “Beauregard… Not Lionett?”

Beau froze at the name. “How the fuck do you know that name?” 

“I’m…” she cleared her throat and lowered her arms, sheathing her dagger. “I’m Vex’ahlia de Rolo. When you were a child I-”

“The merc with the bear,” Beau said, realization dawning on her face.

“I- Yes, although we buried my Trinket almost ten years ago now.” He was buried in the family graveyard with a grave marker that read ‘Trinket de Rolo’ and she didn’t even mind how much Scanlan teased her about it. Keyleth always made sure it was decorated with fresh flowers whenever she came to visit.

“You know this woman?” the man behind her asked, watching Vex with calculated caution.

“Sort of?” Beau answered, though her inflection made it sound like a question. “My dad was pissing me off so I ran away and she brought me back.”

Vex cleared her throat and tried to swallow a smile. “It, uh…” She couldn’t hold back a quiet chuckle. “It’s good to see you’re doing well. I was worried about you. You’ve made some…” She met the goblin’s eyes again as she slowly came out from behind the man’s leg, her hood pulled back up to shield her face. “... interesting friends.”

“Oh, uh-” Beau cleared her throat and turned back to gesture at the others. “This is Caleb, Nott, Jester, Fjord, and Caduceus. They’re…” She paused significantly. “They’re my family.”

Vex nodded in understanding and gestured behind Caleb. “May I…” She let the end of the sentence hang. Caleb hesitated but took a step to the left to reveal Nott, the goblin, though he was still watching her carefully. Vex bent over and gave her a diplomatic smile. “I am very sorry that I chased you. I didn’t realize you were a friend.”

Nott frowned and stepped back behind Caleb. “It’s fine!” she said, hurriedly. “I wasn’t scared or anything, I coulda taken ya!”

Vex chuckled and stood back up straight just in time to see Beau fondly roll her eyes. “Ignore her,” Beau said. “She’s all talk.” The goblin kicked the back of Beau’s knee but the monk barely seemed affected and just shifted her weight to her other leg to keep herself on her feet.

Vex cleared her throat and nodded. “Well. It was very good to see you, Beau. I’ll leave you to it.” She sorta shifted awkwardly and then turned to leave.

“I liked her!” she heard the blue tiefling say loudly. “I should wear a feather in my hair, do you think I should wear a feather in my hair?”

“Uh, hey!” Beau called out before she turned the corner. Vex paused and looked back at her. “You were right!” Vex raised an eyebrow in confusion and tilted her head. The others had turned and started going the other way down the road except for Caleb who kept his hand on her arm. “About people like us.” Then she turned to follow them, talking quietly with her family.

Vex was smiling when she walked away. She didn’t even mind having to go bail Keyleth out of jail for breaking and entering into a private garden to check on the cacti.

“They’re not made for this climate, Vex! They need special care!” Vex just nodded along and didn’t argue as she signed the paperwork and handed over the gold. Keyleth watched her curiously as her close friend led her out of the building. “You’re in a good mood. I-I’m not complaining though but why?”

Vex hummed and shrugged. “No real reason. I just found out that something I always regretted… turned out kinda okay.”

Keyleth frowned. “That’s vague, I don’t like it. You have to tell me, please and thank you.” She added the ‘please and thank you’ as kind of an afterthought when she realized that the first part of her sentence was kind of abrasive.

“There was this girl, about 20 years ago,” Vex relented with a sigh. “I was asked to save her but after I did… It didn’t feel like I’d helped her, it felt like I’d abandoned her in a shitty situation but at the time I didn’t know what else to do. You know, short of kidnapping her and taking her home with me.”

“I would have supported you in that,” Keyleth interjected. “There are times I wish I could go back in time and kidnap you and Vax from your dad.”

Vex stopped walking entirely and just blinked at her in amazement. “Wait, I need to clarify something. Is that something that you can actually do?”

“Hmm? I don’t know, maybe. I’ve got more than a thousand years to think about it, maybe I’ll come up with something.”

Vex sighed. “You’re no help. I wanted you to tell me that leaving her behind that day was the right thing to do but now you’ve just made my head hurt.”

Keyleth giggled. “Sorry. I can’t tell you whether it was the right thing to do. So, you met this girl in the city?”

“Yeah. And she was… kinda badass. And she didn’t hate me, which is kind of surprising now that I think about it. She didn’t thank me either, so I’m not sure what that says. She had some good people with her, I think. A family, like ours.”

Keyleth gave her a sappy grin and put her arm around her shoulder, gently leading her to start walking forward again. “Then she’ll be alright.” Vex smiled back and rested her head on Keyleth’s shoulder, letting herself be led through the streets of Zadash before she realized that Keyleth was not taking her to the tavern.

“We are not going back to that garden, Kiki. I’m fucking hungry.”

“Aww, but- Oh, fine.”


End file.
